Post
by karamustafapasha » Tue Nov 15, 2011 10:27 pm
I was interested in this question and so I have been looking into it. I have discussed off list with someone I know who knows a lot about this war and has posted a lot on this forum about it in the past, he no longer posts here now.
In any case I think that the Swedish list on pg 105 is a bit weird but its size is useful – i.e. it is useful for the purpose of this that it has 6 battalions. I asked what size/type force should face this in 1708-09 and the answer was use history. It was pointed out that in the battles of the main Swedish army in this period they only fielded 12 battalions, i.e. about twice the size of the list in the book. So it would be easy to scale down the historical opponents to give a realistic Russian list.
During this period there are 2 field actions which feature Swedish combined armies – Holowczyn and Poltava. I have used the Dawn of the Tsarist Empire book for this.
Holowczyn is a Swedish attack on a strong position which is also heavily fortified. The Russians had 24 battalions (2 grenadier, 5 ‘elite’ and 17 ordinary line battalions), 34 light guns, 12 heavy guns, 60 dragoon squadrons, something like 6 to 16 squadrons of Cossacks/Kalmucks. There were lots more Russians around but only these troops were engaged.
So in BLB terms and halved because this is what 12 battalions faced this gives –
3 or 4 Grenadier/’elite’ battalions – Elite, the grenadiers are all muskets.
8 or 9 Line battalions – mostly Drilled with 1 or 2 Raw.
30 squadrons of Dragoons – mostly Drilled but with some Raw (20-30%).
3 to 8 squadrons of light cavalry – Raw but up to 2 squadrons of Drilled Kalmucks
5 light guns and 2 heavy guns.
Remember the Russians will need some defenses/good terrain with this army.
Poltava – Here I am really talking just about the main big attack. There are other forces around but including them just makes things silly. This action is more or less a straight fight in the open. The Russians had 53 battalions (7 guard, 7 grenadier, 7 ‘elite’, 32 ordinary line battalions), 117.5 cavalry squadrons (17.5 horse grenadier and ‘elite’, 100 line squadrons), up to 25 squadrons of Cossack/Kalmuck light cavalry, 68 (or maybe more) light guns and 32 heavy guns.
So in BLB terms and halved because this is what 12 battalions faced this gives –
3 or 4 Guard battalions – Guard
3 or 4 Grenadier battalions – Elite, all muskets.
3 or 4 ’elite’ battalions – Elite
16 Line battalions – mostly Drilled with 2 to 4 Raw.
8 or 9 horse grenadier/’elite’ squadrons – Elite Dragoons
50 squadrons of Dragoons – mostly Drilled but with some Raw (10-20%).
6 to 12 squadrons of light cavalry – Raw but up to 2 squadrons of Drilled Kalmucks
11 light guns and 5 heavy guns.
The two battles are in a way the 2 extremes that the Swedes could face. At Holowczyn are something like the minimum force the Swedes would face & also not particularly strong in ‘good’ units, although their position/defenses should help. Poltava is the other extreme (although it could get a lot more extreme if you add in other forces) and is something like the maximum force they would face but at least it is in the open. If fighting battles on the tabletop you should often probably use forces somewhere between these 2 extremes. So say if the Russians just have a reasonably defensive position or field defenses then they should have a force between these 2.
I hope this helps.
Ginger
May they be successful and cover themselves with glory on the table top.
